Empty Nests

When the reclusive Huguette Clark, the most famous heiress no one had ever seen, died in May, she left behind her collections of dolls and Impressionist art, and three spectacular properties estimated to be worth more than $180 million. Tom Acitelli walks us through Clark's much coveted (but little seen) holdings.

Most Read

Huguette Clark, an heiress to a $500 million copper fortune, died on May 24 at age 104, in the New York hospital where she had been living for the past 20 years. Her death began what is perhaps the greatest real estate parlor game in america — namely, how much would her three main properties, each evocative of a certain kind of grand lifestyle that passed away long before she did, sell for — if they were to sell at all?

Clark's will takes two of those properties — a sprawling estate in Santa Barbara crowned by a 21,666-square-foot mansion and a combined 42-room apartment on the edge of Central Park — out of the running for now. The third, a chateau on 52 prime acres in New Canaan, Connecticut, has been listed for eight figures.

Clark's father, Montana senator William A. Clark (1838–1925), made a fortune in mining and railroads during the same baronial era that produced Morgan, Carnegie, and rockefeller. His second marriage — he was 62 at the time; his bride, 23 — produced Huguette and an older sister, who died in 1919. But although the descendants of Clark's four surviving half-siblings from her father's first marriage may yet make claims on their estranged relative's fortune, it appears for now that most of Clark's splendid property, some of which she never visited, belongs to a longtime caretaker and a goddaughter.

Still, what if? We asked real estate agents and appraisers to put a price on Clark's grand real estate legacy.

Bellosguardo, Santa Barbara: Clark's will specifies that this property be converted into a museum.

Features & Amenities: Bellosguardo — the name means "beautiful view" in Italian — unfolds over 23 bluff-top acres on the Gold Coast of southern Santa Barbara County, amid properties that have in recent years sold for titanic sums. The 21,666-square- foot house sits at the end of a gated private drive and was commissioned by Clark's mother Anna in 1933 and designed by architect Reginald Johnson. (Clark's father bought the estate, including the original house, which was done in the style of an Italian villa, for $300,000 in 1923, two years before he died. Anna demolished it.) Little is known about the current multiwinged house — it has two floors, a central courtyard, and possibly 9.5 bathrooms, if old tax records are to be believed — and Clark likely visited it only sporadically during her last half century. (Perhaps because it held bitter memories: A 22-year-old Huguette married 23-year-old bank clerk William Gower at Bellosguardo in 1928, only to divorce him in Reno two years later.)

The Financials: "I would say $100 million is a starting point," says Stephen Schott, the owner of Santa Barbara appraisal firm Schott & Company. It's certainly not out of the question. George Lucas bought a 1.7-acre estate here for $19 million in 2010. Oprah Winfrey bought a 40-acre spread in 2001 for around $50 million, which appreciated to nearly $85 million by the time she hosted a fundraiser for Barack Obama at it six years later. But perhaps the best precedent-setting comparison for the Clark estate was the 2007 purchase of four oceanfront parcels, totaling 15 acres, by billionaire hedge fund manager Bruce Kovner for $83.3 million. In 2009 Kovner bought a fifth parcel, of seven acres, from Kevin Costner for $25 million. That's 22 acres for $108.3 million. On the other hand, Schott cautions, there would be one major hitch in a possible nine-figure sale: Bellosguardo is adjacent to an active cemetery. There's also the fact that the house hasn't been seen by anyone in decades; Clark herself is rumored to have last visited the property in 2006. Otherwise, its only inhabitants have been the generations of caretakers who have maintained the house on Clark's behalf. "We've got a house where no one knows what condition it's in. We don't know if it has original plumbing and electrical from the day it was built. We have no idea what's been upgraded and what hasn't," says Greg Tice, an executive at Sotheby's International in Santa Barbara County. "We've been on the outside looking in all these years." Tice says a client of his firm once made a standing offer of $50 million for the estate, but never heard from Clark.

907 Fifth Avenue, New York City: Clark left the property to her goddaughter and her former caretaker.

Features & Amenities: After William Clark died in 1925, Huguette and her widowed mother moved from a 121-room mansion at 962 Fifth Avenue — it cost more to build than the original Yankee Stadium but has since been torn down — to the 12th-floor penthouse of a limestone building at 72nd Street and Fifth Avenue. This was around the time when the elite of Manhattan were migrating from the city mansions they had spent the 19th century constructing into apartments in newer, suitably exclusive buildings. By the 1950s mother and daughter had acquired the entire eighth floor, as well as half of the 12th, and it would be within these 15,000-plus square feet that the 24-year-old Huguette secluded herself after her divorce, in 1930. Anna would die in 1963, and Huguette treated 907 Fifth as her redoubt, ensuring its survival as a sort of real estate time capsule. After World War II and through the 1960s, the building was chopped up into ever-smaller apartments, as were buildings throughout the city. Gradually, the large luxury spreads that defined that era transitioned from mansions to apartments. In fact, Clark's combined units may comprise the largest luxury apartment left in Manhattan, the sort with a 30-foot-long library, followed by a 40-foot drawing room, followed by an even more impressive living room: a glorious 110-foot run ending in sweeping views of Central Park.

The Financials: Clark's 28-room eighth-floor portion alone would fetch up to $40 million, brokers say. Throw in the 14-room 12th-floor portion — which was reserved strictly for her multimillion-dollar doll collection — for a 42-room reminder of how luxury apartment living was 80 years ago, and the price jumps past $60 million. "It's probably one of the largest apartments on Fifth, in terms of just the 28 rooms on the eighth floor," says Donna Olshan, president of luxury brokerage Olshan Realty. "Putting a price on it is like putting a price on a unique painting." (The property was where Clark kept the art- work, including Renoirs, that will grace the museum at Bellosguardo.) If Clark's heirs list the property, and if the units sell, either together or as separate pieces, records will be set. Currently, the most expensive apartment deal in U.S. history was a $48.83 million penthouse duplex trade at 1060 Fifth Avenue in the fall of 2008. The Clark units — which are rumored to have attracted attention from Martha Stewart, who already has a unit in the building — would leave those figures in the dust.

Le Beau Chateau, New Canaan: Clark listed the property in April 2011 for $24 million.

Features & Amenities: Like Bellosguardo, Le Beau Chateau commands much attention today for its sheer size. "The entire property, at 52 acres of well-preserved land — you just don't have 52 acres within an hour radius of New York City," says Barbara Cleary, of Barbara Cleary's Realty Guild, who was the estate's listing broker. "So it's a very special offering, with the chateau right in the middle of the land." The house itself has 22 rooms, including eight bedrooms and a master suite. The 12,766-square-foot property also has 11 fireplaces, a music room, an artist's studio, a library, a third-floor great room, and 13-foot ceilings throughout; the ones on the third floor are soaring. There are also certain flourishes that bespeak its age: mint-condition GE appliances from the 1950s, never plugged in; a trunk room, which was a popular feature of houses from the era of steamships; and concrete floors reinforced with steel, which were standard for manses built before World War II. (Clark, who bought the estate in 1951, purchased it for its very solidity; she thought she might have to use it as a nuclear bomb shelter.) This was quite a palatial layoutfor the childless and divorced Clark — but she probably never set foot in Le Beau Chateau. In fact, according to Cleary, the estate's original owner looms much larger than its eventual one. Pennsylvania senator David Aiken Reed commissioned its design from Voorhees, Gmelin, and Walker, a New York firm known for its Art Deco buildings, in 1934, shortly after he lost reelection. Clark bought it from the Reeds, and it has been looked after ever since by a succession of caretakers living in two four-room cottages on the property. The current ones are a father-and-son duo. (The father has been working at the property for 31 years.)

The Financials: The property's relatively high price tag is based on recent sales of much smaller estates nearby. For example, a six-bedroom house on just over four acres sold in May for $6.5 million, according to Zillow.com. Multiply the bedrooms and the acreage many times, and the Clark estate price seems entirely reasonable. That the estate has been subdivided into 10 lots boosts its value as well, according to Taylor Beerbower, owner of Fairfield County appraisal firm Mulberry Street Appraisals, although individual lot buyers might find themselves responsible for costly upgrades, like driveways to their properties, and they should bear in mind that the current chateau costs as much as $6,000 a month to heat in the winter. "It's just rare to have a site like this that's contiguous," Beerbower says. "It really creates that old, grand estate feel that you used to have up and down, throughout Westchester and Fairfield counties — back when it was commonplace."